Xbox One S vs $500 PC
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2017-05-06
·
1,780 words · ~8 min read
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about every year and a half PC gamers are used to getting a whole new
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generation of graphics cards with noticeably better performance that they
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can easily slot into their existing system for a quick upgrade console fans
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though are usually forced to wait long periods for a new generation of tech for
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example it was eight freaking years between the release date of the Xbox 360
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and the Xbox one so to alleviate this problem somewhat console makers have
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been releasing incremental updates to existing platforms just like the new
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Xbox One S from Microsoft with improved performance and functionality Beyond
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just being smaller can it trade blows with a modern gaming PC let's find
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out Mast drop is featuring The AKG k553
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Pro Studio headphones featuring ovar close back construction check them out
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in the link in the description down below with past console Generations
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refreshes of the same platform usually took the form of adding enhanced
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connectivity such as Wi-Fi and some additional storage space but the Xbox
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One S has taken a bit of a different approach to console redesign although
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there is now a 2 tbte option doubling the capacity of the previous largest
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Xbox one model the other improvements are quite a bit more interesting not
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only is the Xbox One S 40% smaller than the original Behemoth Microsoft also o
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ditched the massive external power brick in favor for an internal power supply
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you now only need to use one rather small power cord to plug it into the
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wall despite this the 1s remains surprisingly light and easy enough to
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move around when you need to so points to Microsoft for that the Standard
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Edition comes in a white color scheme with black trim which in my opinion is
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pretty slick especially compared to the original Xbox one which some folks
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myself included said looked a little drab in the box you'll find an updated
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controller which is very similar to the original but with Bluetooth for
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connecting to PCS some improved range and a textured grip so it won't go
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squirting out of your hand in a tense moment also this new IR Blaster which
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can accept inputs for multiple devices so you can control things like your TV
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and one of the big selling points here is 4K support which is completely absent
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from the original Xbox one but there's a caveat perhaps unsurprisingly this
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doesn't mean you can Render games at 4K if you want this you'll have to wait for
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yet another xbox update code named project Scorpio due in late 2017 what
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the Xbox One S does instead is upscale 1080p games to 4K so the Xbox will play
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nicely with your 4K TV in your living room if you have one but do note that
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your TV or monitor will need to be HDMI
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2.0 compliant for this upscaling to work at all but if you can live without true
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4K gaming and are mainly interested in using 4K to watch movies and TV shows
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the good news is that the Xbox One S can not only handle 4K streaming from
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services like Netflix but also supports 4K Blu-ray discs natively a very nice
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feature for home theater enthusiasts who want the superior sound quality of a
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physical disc and folks who don't have good enough internet connection to
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stream 4K by comparison the Xbox One s's
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closest competitor the soon to be released PlayStation 4 Pro only supports
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HD Blu-ray the 1s also features HDR or
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high dynamic range support which will give you nicer colors and more realistic
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contrast if you have a TV that supports it but what's going on inside the
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internals are mostly the same as you can see from these tear down photos from our
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friends over at iFixit but one very interesting difference is theoc has
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undergone a die shrink using a 16 nanometer process as opposed to the 28
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present in the original Xbox One this allows it to use less power probably the
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reason Microsoft was able to fit the PSU inside the chassis and to be clocked
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significantly faster indeed the Xbox One S supports 914 MHz on the GPU 61 more
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than the original model and that leads into The $64,000 Question how well does
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it game a common Point made by PC Gamers
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who isue consoles is that even a mid-range GPU will easily overperform
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the latest consoles so we put the Xbox One S up against the moderately priced
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AMD radon rx470 as well as the more
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premium NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 to see
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how close the console can get to PC quality visuals in three different
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titles the system we used with our rx470 came in just at about $500 on PC part
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picker while our more performance-oriented GTX 1070 system
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came in at just a little bit under $1,250 Microsoft has been pushing pretty
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hard how the Xbox One S apparently functions very well during intense
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sequences in gear of War 4 so let's start with that make sure you have the
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Cog wheel on YouTube set to 1080p60 so
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that you can see the differences here now to Microsoft's credit the game
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remained perfectly playable even during combat situations and the game looked
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quite nice overall but it's rather easy to tell here that both our mid-range and
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higher-end PCs ran the game a lot more smoothly even on ultra settings our PC's
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gpus also enabled slightly nicer looking textures across the board moving on to
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Forza Horizon 3 the results were rather similar the rx470 and the GTX 1070 gave
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us smoother gameplay as well as better detail on things like bodies of water
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and environmental elements such as the sides of these Canyons draw distances
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also appear to be quite a bit better on PC although it must be noted that the
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problem was not removed entirely just kind of moved back to a hopefully less
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focused on area there was also less aliasing noticeable on things like guard
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rails and foliage however we did run into some stutter ing issues on PC that
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we didn't have to deal with on the Xbox which Microsoft should be addressing
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with a patch but nevertheless image quality was a bit better on PC with
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smoother gameplay even though we were running things on ultra settings it's
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just unfortunate that we had yet another case of a less polished PC version of a
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game finally rise of the Tomb Raider this game also looked actually quite
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good on the Xbox One S though once again it was a lot less smooth than it was on
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either of our PC gpus which were running the game at the very high preset
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although the Xbox One S came in a lot closer to matching our PC in the image
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quality Department than either of the two previous games there were still some
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noticeable differences on things like these vertical sheets of ice Laura Croft
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has to climb now moving on unfortunately
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the Xbox's 4K output did not want to play nicely with our capture equipment
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so we don't have footage for you but what I can tell you is that the
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upscaling was quite good in all of our test titles although it's still lagged
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behind PC in terms of smoothness of play and image quality and in no way does
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this upscaling substitute for actual native 4K rendering our game still looks
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pretty darn good without any significant slowdowns from the 1080p mode or
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excessive blurriness or any of that stuff so if you happen to have a 4K TV I
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definitely recommend enabling this feature and at least trying it out now
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this performance section may have come across rather negative to the 1s but put
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into perspective itive of price it actually shouldn't there are obvious and
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major trade-offs like the upgradability of a PC the versatility of a keyboard
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and mouse for input the expandability the option to do other things etc etc
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I'm sure you're all well versed in this but despite all of that and despite my
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preference definitely being on the PC side of things getting for
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300 4K Blu-ray support which is nearly impossible to find on PCS right now and
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some actually pretty DEC performance was impressive personally of course I would
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choose a PC any day for a huge amount of reasons like the agility of an SSD for
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the wide variety of tasks that I perform on a computer at a time to actually
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being able to get work done in an optimal setting but what do you choose
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let me know in the comments down below and try not to kill each other while
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you're at it that would be wonderful freshbooks is excited to announce the
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and put an end to all the guessing games for your unrestricted 30-day free trial
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just go to freshbooks.com techtips and enter Linus techtips in the how did You
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Hear About Us section thanks for watching guys if this video
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sucked you know what to do but if it was awesome get subscribed hit the like button or check out the link where to
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buy stuff like an Xbox 1s but you'll probably end up buying PC components
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that's also cool Amazon link video description down below also check out
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our merch store down there while you're down there go on the community Forum
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talk about this thing compar to PC also
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again try not to kill each other we like actually have moderators over there and
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don't start a flame War just talk about the positives and negatives without
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getting get mad at each other don't be a dick welcome to the internet see you
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next time watch this video if you want to see our old school image comparison
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versus the original Xbox One see you